The Light in a Dark Abyss
by ValaMagic
Summary: What happens between Angela taking Brennan home and Booth turning up at her apartment in 'The Woman in Limbo? Just a short tag.


AN: Okay, so i know this is going way back since it's a tag for the 'The Woman in Limbo' but anyway... here it is... enjoy.

The Light in a Dark Abyss

"Temperance, go home" how could he tell her to go home. That was the only thing worse than going to court. If she went home she'd be completely alone. Angela would drop her off and then she'd go back to the Jeffersonian. If Brennan asked her she'd stay, but Brennan wouldn't ask, she was far too stubborn.

"I'm really sorry Bren" They were the first words Angela had said since they'd gotten in the car, but that didn't bother Brennan, she didn't want to talk.

"Angela... It's been fifteen years, the chances of my mother still being alive fifteen years after she disappeared are pretty slim."

"Even so Sweetie, it's your mum."

"I don't really want to talk about it right now Ange"

"Yeah, okay, if you need anything just give me a call"

"I'll be fine" but she wasn't fine, no matter how much she tried to tell herself she was. The door to her apartment banged shut behind her and for the first time in her adult life she didn't even think to dead bolt it.

She let her purse and coat drop to the floor and without flipping any lights on she wandered through the house to her bedroom. She didn't really know what she was doing there. She didn't know anything anymore. She didn't even register her body dropping to the bed or the tears that started to fall freely from her eyes drenching her comforter. She tried not to remember that it was the same colour as the one on her parents bed when she was young. She tried not to think about her mother's bones stored down in limbo, the number of times she'd walked past them, possibly even examined them.

She'd never been good with feelings and she had no idea how she felt. If her mother was dead did that mean her father was probably dead too? Her mother was dead. That in itself was shocking enough.

How long she lay on her bed just crying she had no idea, but when she finally wiped a dripping nose and eyes on her sleeve, a completely un Temperance Brennan action. She took a few deep steadying breaths. She felt lost. Empty. She wanted to shut the world out but she couldn't. Instead she dragged herself off the bed, shed her clothes quickly, shivering not just because of the cold but because of the fear that had lodged itself inside her heart.

When she slipped under the hot spray of the shower she was surprised by how alone she felt. She'd been alone for fifteen years and it had never bothered her before. She could have called David and he would have come over, he would have understood but instead she pulled some clothes on and curled onto her sofa her thoughts completely blank. She was numb

Eventually her thoughts turned to the box that she still had in the back of her closet with the few things she still had from her childhood, the few memories of a mother and father she would ever see again and the brother who had betrayed her. For a moment she thought about pulling it out, but she wasn't the sort of woman who spent a lot of time thinking about the past, you couldn't change the past, she knew that.

In the back of her mind she knew she should fix herself some food, that the last time she'd eaten was that morning, and she hadn't eaten much worrying about her court date. She knew Booth would take her out for lunch anyway, he always did on court day. But she'd never made it to court, because her mother was dead.

It seemed silly to mourn something that had happened almost fifteen years ago, yet to her it was all new, because she'd never known what had happened.

Maybe she should call David after all, thinking about things wasn't getting her anywhere. Maybe a night of wild sex would help. But as she was reaching for the phone, tears threatening to fall again she heard the knock on the door. She knew who it was. The man who was always there for her, the one she could always count on. The one who made sure even when her parents didn't that she wasn't alone, that somebody cared about her.

"Booth. What are you doing here?"


End file.
